It will probably take hundreds court hearings over several months before we have an clear view of the role played by social media and smartphones in this week’s riots. Nevertheless, David Cameron has already said the government already wants to explore new controls on these technologies.
“We are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality,” he told MPs on Thursday.
The Prime Minister was talking about users of the two dominant social networks, Facebook and Twitter, and BlackBerry Messenger, RIM’s instant messenger service, which is particularly popular among urban youths.
Though very light on detail, the plans immediately raise myriad technical and legal issues.
Most obviously, how would authorities know which people are using smartphones and social media to encourage riots?
No comments:
Post a Comment